"You don't mean that she showed you my letters?" "Oh, no; she didn't show them to me. But I know well enough what they were like. You are a pair of young dunces." Fairfield cast down his eyes and studied his finger-nails in silence a moment. When he looked up again he spoke gravely and with a new firmness. "Mrs. Harbinger," he said, "I hope you don't think that I meant anything wrong in answering her letters. I didn't know who wrote them." "You must have known that they were written by a girl that was young and foolish." "I'm afraid I didn't think much about that. I had a letter, and it interested me, and I answered it. It never occurred to me that--" "It never occurs to a man that he is bound to protect a girl against herself," Mrs. Harbinger responded quickly. "At least now that you do know, I hope that there'll be no more of this nonsense." Fairfield did not reply for a moment. Then he looked out over the landscape instead of meeting her eyes. "What do you expect me to say to that?" he asked. "I don't know that I expect anything," she returned dryly. "Hush! They are coming." He leaned forward, and spoke in a hurried whisper. "Does she know?" he demanded. "Of course not. She thinks it's the Count, for all I can tell." The arrival of Alice and May put an end to any further confidential discourse. Fairfield rose hastily, looking dreadfully conscious, but as the two girls had some interesting information or other to impart to Mrs. Harbinger, he had an opportunity to recover himself, and in a few moments the party was on its way to the polo-field. With the game this story has nothing in particular to do. It was not unlike polo games in general. The playing was neither especially good nor especially bad. Jack Neligage easily carried off the honors, and the men pronounced his playing to be in remarkable form for so early in the season. Fairfield sat next to Miss Calthorpe, but he was inclined to be quiet, and to glance at Mrs. Harbinger when he spoke, as if he expected her to be listening to his conversation. Now and then he fixed his attention on the field, but when the game was over, and the clever plays were discussed, he showed no signs of knowing anything about them. To him the game had evidently been only an accident, and in no way a vital part of the real business of the day.